Fixing It
by Eve Davidson
Summary: Ashley goes to Ellie's apartment to beg her to help her make up with Craig after she sent him to Ellie's group. Season 4. Ellie point of view.
1. Chapter 1

I grabbed a coke from the fridge and swigged it. God, I missed Sean. But he took off. Dealing with his issues. That was fine. I'd be fine. But the place was a mess. I never felt like cleaning. And it looked awful with the sun streaming in full force. I didn't even have curtains.

Sat on the couch, flipped on the T.V. Mindless shit came on but that was okay. I was in the mood for mindless shit. Then I hear the knock on the door. The urgent knock. I mute the T.V. Pet Ferret Beuhler. Blow him a kiss. It was just me and Beuhler now.

"Hi, Ashley," I say, opening the door for her. She rushes in.

"Hi, Ellie," I take my coke that I'd left on the counter and sip from it. Ashley looks all upset, all frazzled. But I'm calm. She runs a nervous hand through her hair.

"Ellie, you need to help me," she says, and I sigh. She's distracted and worried and I know this worry now. Craig worry. I'd tried to tell her that she can't worry about him like that. She can't solve his problems. He wouldn't want her to. I close my eyes and suppress a sigh. I'm identifying more with Craig than with Ashley, which is a switch. I remembered the Manny pregnancy thing from grade 10 and how I was totally on her side. He was scum. But now…she's not doing something right.

"It's Craig, he's totally pissed at me,"

"Let me guess," I said, deadpan, "he's pissed because you sent him to my group,"

"Yeah, he is, and I guess I might have been wrong to do that to him. But I wasn't trying to embarrass him, I just wanted him to, you know, get some help. I knew that that group would be good for him…"

Poor Ashley. Poor problem free Ashley. I knew I wasn't being fair, but really. Did the girl even have problems? They weren't in the league of my problems, or Craig's. But that was how things were supposed to be, wasn't it? Having alcoholic parents or abusive parents wasn't how it should be. Cutting and being mentally ill and that sort of thing wasn't how it should go.

"What did he do?" I asked, finishing my coke, glancing at Beuhler rolling around on the worn out carpet.

"He yelled at me, slammed his locker, and walked away,"

I nodded. What I knew of Craig, mostly second hand from Ashley, I figured he was beyond pissed. He usually joked his way around things. Or was quiet. She'd done it this time.

"How can I help?" I said, feeling kind of good that someone wanted help from me. I usually felt like the screwed up one who needed help.

"Go to his house with some dumb excuse and talk to him, tell him I'm sorry and that I love him and I'm worried…fix it,"

Fix it. I nearly laughed. It just seemed to me that there was no fixing some things. I could maybe smooth this over but it wouldn't be addressing the real problem. She should never have sent him to my group in the first place. She shouldn't be worrying about him like this. Trying to fix him like he's broken. This is who he is. If she loves him she loves him, not some idealized half remembered version of him.

But she looks at me with those big pleading blue eyes and her lip stuck out in an exaggerated pout and of course I say yes. I say yes even though I don't really want to get in the middle of their thing. I don't want to get involved in her smothering mothering of him. Watching him to see if he takes his meds? Monitoring his moods? No wonder he's pissed at her.

"Thanks, Ellie," she said, hugging me, resting her head on my shoulder. I patted her, slipped into my boots, and wondered what in the hell I was going to say to him.


	2. Chapter 2

I dragged the guitar me and Sean used to fool around on. I dragged it with me to Craig's house, figured I could ask him to restring it or something. I didn't know what would be a good excuse to get me in there and talking to him about Ashley worrying and pissing him off.

Craig and I hardly talk. We basically know each other through Ashley. My best friend. His psychotic love interest. That's not fair, I knew. I wasn't on the inside of their relationship, didn't know how things really went down for either of them. That didn't matter. I was here to fix things.

I knocked, feeling the nervous, 'I shouldn't really be here,' feeling that you get when you're sent on a mission. I licked my lips, blinked, knocked again. Maybe he wouldn't even be here.

He opened the door, looking kind of younger in his jean jacket, his curly hair touching the collar. He saw me and my guitar and gave me this look, like he knew what was up. He turned away but left the door open. I took that as an invitation to come in, so I did.

"Do you know how to restring a guitar?" I said to his back. It's funny how when people have their back to you you can still tell what the expression on their face is.

"Is that the best excuse Ashley could come up with?" he said. Then he did turn around. He was so closed up, so guarded. It wasn't easy being damaged, I knew.

"She's worried about you," I said, trying to get him to look into my eyes. He wouldn't. I tried talking about some of the other people at group, how they were cool and they were dealing with things and that he could, too. He wasn't buying it, though.

He turned away from me again. Fiddled with something on the kitchen table.

"I think it sucks having bipolar. Am I the only one who thinks it sucks?"

I sat down on the couch, my guitar next to me. I wanted to tell him that I understood this. I understood that it was different being the one with the problem, and that all these people all around you wanted to help but they didn't get it. That was the point of the group. Those people were dealing with similar things, they were on the inside, too.

He was having none of it, and I kind of liked that. He was fighting this. He wouldn't just give in and be "bipolar" and need all this therapy and psychiatrists and medication and a girlfriend who was worrying her head off.

"Ash loves you…" I said, and I thought about how he was so upset about the group because I was there. Because he kind of knew me from school. But what did that matter? I was at the group, too. It wasn't like I was better than him. It wasn't like I'd go and tell a million people he went to the group.

"Paige was the one who really helped me, last year, she got me to go and talk to Ms. Sauve-"

"So?" he said, sharp, kind of surprising me. All that anger that was in him. It was just the tip of the iceberg.

"So, me and Paige never really got along, she was this snobby cheerleader who always had to have everything her way. She was the type of person that made me cringe, like biting on aluminum with a filling. But she helped me and now we're cool, Paige and me. It's not all so negative, Craig. These things, like cutting or being bipolar or being a drug addict, sometimes they let you see other sides of people, other sides of yourself. It's just, I don't know,"

I'd kind of lost what I was trying to say. I wanted him to see that things were this way, you couldn't just wish it away. Like wishing yourself away. And if he wasn't bipolar would he be so much happier, no problems? Is that what he thought? I peered at him, and he was looking down, almost looking like he was going to cry. I wasn't sure if I was doing that good of a job fixing things.


End file.
